What Mackenzie Phillips Regrets About Revealing Her Incestuous Relationship on Oprah Show

Mackenzie Phillips, the daughter of Mamas & Papas singer John Phillips, started taking drugs when she was in her pre-teens. With her father’s support, she says, she would inject cocaine. Over time she became an addict and failed to sober up after several stints in rehab. In 2009, with the publication of her memoir High on Arrival, the 49-year-old actress visited the Oprah Show and opened up about her decade-long incestuous relationship with her father that took place over years of heavy drug use.

It was a revelation that sent shock waves across the country and deeply upset some members of Mackenzie’s family, who denied that anything improper happened between her and their father. Today, Mackenzie tells Oprah, there’s one thing she would considering doing differently. “Maybe I would have gotten them all together and prepared them better,” Mackenzie says. On the other hand, she says, “They already knew, you see. The thing is when they all say, ‘We didn’t know,’ they already knew, and that is something that one has to just deal with.”

Here, Mackenzie opens up about the fallout from going public with her family’s dark secret.